Its been a fun busy filled winter so far up here on Leech Lake. I got to meet a lot of new IDO faithful, and got to fish with the crew myself. I cannot the believe the walleye season is coming down to just this weekend. That does however mean that I will almost have the whole lake to myself and the surrounding lakes. I know Phil will be out in the spring too. I know after eel pout I am ready to take some days away from the front desk and at the resort and chase some perch and gills. However I am still going to walleye chase till the end.
Walleye have slowed down on the lake and the anglers that are catching them are finding them in the lowlight and evening periods. I have found that the shoreline breaks and first humps have been starting to have active fish again. Not a lot of keeper fish out there but lots of big slot fish. In Walker bay they have been biting shallower then they were 2 weeks ago. The best bite I heard was in 13-16 ft of water over this past weekend.
Perch have been either a home run or a big K. The sun really helps in the shallows for the perch but having no sun the fishing does slow down. The shallow bays have been good in 6-10 ft of water in the weeds for perch, full minnows and small jigs have worked best. We have caught a couple off of the deep reefs but they are very finicky to get to bite some days. The perch will continue to get better as we get into march. I am guessing we will have fishable ice through the third weekend but no guarantees since we do not have 3 feet of ice like previous years.
Tullibee/whitefish are starting to get better. I woke up this morning to a line of anglers waiting to get out to the hole right in front of the resort to chase them. I can usually tell if it is good by the number of people out front and its growing each day. I usually do not fish for them but they are popular, I get more people asking for them then perch now.
Crappies and Gills are being caught on the smaller local lakes. Most of my guests are going to the panfish lakes during the day and coming back to leech for the evening walleye bite. We have seen some really nice catches of blue gill and crappie down at the cleaning shack.
Its a great time to get out on the lake and there is not that much pressure out on the lake right now. Makes you feel like you have the whole lake to your self, same with a lot of the little lakes. I have been very lucky to get out and have whole lakes to myself right now.
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